Midnight Moon: Undeniable Circumstances
by Vcorrigan
Summary: It was a strange circumstance that entwined their lives so deeply engrained, and a strange circumstance that kept them slowly circling one another. Christophe was not use to not winning, and Kyle, he's too damn good at the game. Kystophe


_"Stuck like a melody_  
><em>In my head, in the bed of my truck<em>  
><em>By the light of the midnight moon<em>  
><em>Baby, I see you"<em>

In a small town with very few luxuries of wealth, a Friday night among teenagers meant kicking up dust in the fields, lighting up a bonfire that licked tendrils toward a cold November night sky, standing closely entwined under mason-jar lights strung high in the rafters of an abandoned barn. It meant dancing close to music played to loud, and finding liquid courage and warmth in the form of smuggled alcohol from their parent's cabinets. None of the adults looked twice to the whimsical glow elicited from the edge of town where the teenagers roamed gleefully.

It was not at all a place that the stormy brunette had ever let himself be a part of, but tonight with a feigned smile on his face and a fist clamped around a jar of assorted liquor combinations, he'd let his friends pull him into the social congregation. To dull the questions in his mind to a quiet numbing buzz, to take away the sting of the previous days, weeks, years. It was going well, he thought, as each lingering brush of fingers took him from his mind, as each shiny-lipped smile caught his clouded eyes.

Until, sitting high above the milling teens he'd grown up with below, perched on a bale in the old hay loft of the barn they had claimed as their own, he spotted the firey red curls of his torment, his nightmares, his inner demons, catching the scarlet lips of Red Allen wickedly in the dancing firelight.

They had met from circumstance, and been pulled under by undeniability. The undeniable bond of faltering on the edge of death in the calming arms of a shaken boy with crystal green eyes that poured like spring meadows, dripping down onto his ashen skin. Even as each thready heart beat pumped life from his dirty body, he couldn't help but feel regret of hurting this boy he barely knew. It was odd, to care so fondly, so suddenly, in a moment that could never be recovered.

Or, so he thought, until he awoke to the buzzing of a terrible alarm and the smell of gunfire lingering in his nose. But theirs was a bond that could not be described with the limited vocabulary of their third-grade minds. It was a bond built from necessity, from ethics, from the morality one little Jewish boy had held as he tried to hold in the life of a dying French mercenary. It was a bond that was strived and true, despite their clashing personalities. Kyle, of the infinite wisdom, the fierce stubborn demenor, the wicked mean streak that went from zero to sixty in 0.3 seconds. Christophe, of the laissez-faire attitude, with an underlying charm that could win the hearts of anyone...with a deadly streak that kept the masses away.

It was a war that brought them together, and Kyle's mother's infinite anger against corrupting the youth. And it was he same principle, that in sixth-grade, brought them clashing together again. Because Ms. DeLorne - after losing her husband to a Soviet assassination - had found herself again in the form of a curvy blonde that she wanted to make her wife. And it was during the fight between their mother's about the influence of homosexuals openly in front of the children that the boys found themselves drawn to each other again.

And as their PTA mother's battle grew more intense, Kyle's clear solution was to pull the French boy in front of a conglamoration of the townsfolk and kiss him into dizzying embarrassment. _It's no influence of any adults making me do this, Mom, it's my own choice, and I swear to God I'll keep doing it at every graceful function you ever host if you don't stop your nonsense and let two clearly loving, clearly deserving, adults do what they want and marry each other._

It was a promise, at the time, Christophe had edged away from with a flaming red face and a bitter French curse on his tongue that made everyone in the crowd blush in embarrassment for the poor boy foaming at the mouth as he lunged at the freckle-faced red-head in rage. It was a promise that coy sarcastic Jewish boy would hold onto for years to come.

At a boy of thirteen, the Mole didn't know what to think of such a bold move made by the Broflovski boy. Was it only his intense social need to prove a point that had the redhead's lips meet his own in front of so many prying eyes? Or had the lingering of those chapped lips and flaming cheeks meant something more? It was a question that nagged at the back of his mind as he dug into the hard ground to clear his mind of the lingering sense of emotion from that incident.

It was a question that kept him up for months as he awoke from the image of a green-eyed boy whispering his name into his shoulder, awoke with coursing emotions seering his insides that tumbled head-over-heels and left him fumbling uselessly in the presence of his furrow-browed friend. He found himself failing American History, as he refused to study in the lair of his internal torment - he found himself stumbling over his heavy steel-toed boots at soccer practice as his eyes were trained on the lithe form of his angry redheaded friend.

He fought the feelings, tunneling incredible infrastructures around town to avoid those above. On weekends, he packed a bag and trekked out of the outskirts, finding the lull of nature intensely satisfying. Gathering kindling, striking flint, roasting roots and fish over open flame quelled the own flame within.

Until that fateful evening when the sky swirled pink overhead and an old mutt with a ragged pink bandana came hurtling through the trees his direction.

"Sparky, damnit, I can't watch you for one night without you escaping," came the desperate voice that lit his face aflame across the wind, stocky boots crunching on the crinkled, brown leaves scattered across the forest floor. "Stupid dog."

Christophe wasn't having any of the drooling, hyper mess of a dog that Stan adored as he threw himself up a tree and stared down at the barking pooch, wagging his tail happily. He barely noticed Kyle jog into the clearing, stop dead at the precarious image of the Mole clamoring up a tree as Sparky dancing around below whining for the human to come down at pet him.

"I should just leave you like this," Kyle finally said, a smirk spreading over his face as he popped a hand on his hip and raised an amused brow.

"Get Stan's dog away from me," Christophe growled dangerously, shooting daggers with his mercury eyes.

A shrill whistle got both of their attention, and had the dog, grinning, slumping over to the red head with a gleam in his eyes as Kyle snapped the leash on his collar. As Christophe let himself gracefully tumble to his feet from the tree, Kyle stared at him sadly.

"You sure aren't the kind to run from things, Chris."

"Why would you zink I'm running from anyzing? Can't a man enjoy ze outdoors by 'imself?"

"Maybe," he said, kicking a rock absently as he tracked the glimmer of a plane far above. "But I know you. And you've been acting strange, for a while now. Lost, and confused, and something else. You know, you can talk to me, as much as you've been seeming to be avoiding me recently."

A shrug as Christophe split a piece of kindling, tucking the stray fragment between his sharp teeth as he avoided the careful gaze Kyle watched him with. "Zings are not always as zey seem, Broflovski. Maybe I'm just enamored by someone zat will never feel ze same."

"You can never know unless you talk to them, Christophe, we all aren't great people-readers such as yourself. " He shrugged himself, rustling his curls with a nervous hand. "Then again, maybe you aren't so great at reading people."

"Et'll never 'appen, Broflovski. Zere ez a million people in zis world, and moi, moi, I'm not so vairy special as ze rest. I'm just ordinary, strange, moi. But zat, I am okay wiz." He barely noticed the sharp prick of his nails in his palm as he squeezed his fists together and avoided the calm eyes of Kyle, barely noticed the knot he swallowed back in his throat, having been very unready for this assault on his emotions.

"Maybe you need a little more faith in yourself, Christophe, because you're pretty one of a kind, and special in your own way," Kyle said as he patted Sparky's head, tossing him a treat from deep in his pocket as he tied the end of the leash up to a stray tree.

"You're delusuonal."

"And you're oblivious."

"What makes you say zat?" Christophe had asked with a brow cocked as he dug his toes into the hard ground below, staring obscurely at the redhead.

"This." Was the only reply before his world was turned upside down as the redhead grabbed him by shoulders and pulled him close, mushing sweetmint balmed lips against his own. It was as if time had stilled in the clearing that shimmered mysteriously from the sun's faltering setting rays, shadows enlongated under the spindly skeleton of trees losing their pre-winter leaves on the mountain breeze. I was a moment that look his breath away, as if being thrown unremorsefully into an icy lake; heart-stopping, chilling, and deadly. And yet, it was a moment that breathed life into him for the first time in months, as his on-guard heart beat incredibly, pushing all the anxiety and questions and nerves from his mind as his fingers wound into the stiff burgundy curls of his torment and he matched the motion with his lips.

Christophe laughed bitterly as be took a swallow of honey whiskey and savored the burn that settled in his stomach like a fire...like the fire that Kyle had elicited in him years ago, a fire lit by that moment of unreliquished desire in the woods with dumb doggy eyes watching, those same lips now necking on Red Allen by the fire light.

But, this wouldn't have been the first time that stubborn, firey redhead had smashed his emotions like a sledgehammer on cement. It always seemed to be a wavering game to Kyle of the bored tastes and short attention span. No, their furied movements and breathless moments were always shadowed by indecision, by social acceptance, by bitter friendships that barred their publicities. They played their hands close and guarded, played the dance with delicate, precise movements as the months passed and voices deepened, hair grew, social pressures swelled like a rising tide.

No, when high school had come and the girls gave into femininity, glossing lips and pushing busoms to the extreme, it was then Kyle had shrugged those sarcastic shoulders with that coy set on his lips that dared him to proceed, dared him to out them as he laced his long, rough fingers with the perfectly manicured hand of Bebe Stevens.

It was then he found a friend in Clyde, as the blubbering moron whined and groveled on about his blonde princess. The blonde princess that - with a sweep of long curls and bat of mascarared lashes, stomped Kyle into the ground during regional mathletes. She was an impressive girl that constantly changed styles depending on her mood, with large dreams of becoming an aerospace engineer, and no fear of grease under her pretty pink fingernails. A girl that Clyde constantly pined after, leaving small gifts and penned poetry to the rolled-eyes of the red head.

And it was then he learned to spite as he popped a booted-foot in the aisle of the cafeteria while the blonde beauty queen was walking by, leaving her stumbling and spilling her juice all over her perfect outfit. But Christophe's antics didn't make him feel better, he learned as she turned with tears in her eyes and anguish on her face. "_Why do you hate me so much?"_

Kyle's accusing stares only made him feel worse. And it wasn't, he realized, that he hated Bebe...it was just the opposite. So two days later he found her in Tweek's coffee shoppe and confessed with two simple words the answer she was looking for all along, and his own fate with conviction. "_I'm jealous_." And he was - he hated the heated looks Kyle sent his way over the curled-blonde head of his girlfriend, hated the tension when they were all hanging out together in one place. He hated seeing the marshmellowy sweet looks the girl sent to a boy that in no way was committed - hated to see their tender touches, their hands laced, their lips meet. A sense of dismissal burned deep at being the friend to bum a cigarette from directly from the lips, the secret with the toned hips and scarred ribs.

"_Well, now it all just makes sense_." she had replied with a bittersweet smile as she sipped her frothy drink with a gleam in her eyes. And within the week, she had broken it off with Kyle due to "irreconciliable differences", and laced her pretty fingers once more with the chubby sausages of Clyde.

Fingers that now laid on his shoulder, shaking him from his reverie as he looked up into the concerned brown orbs of one of his best friends, and one of his only friends to know about his illicit romance with the Broflovski boy. "Chris, man, stop torturing yourself."

"Whatever do you mean?" he grumbled back as he took a long warm swig of whatever Clyde poured into his Dixie cup.

"You and I both see Kyle down there. Stop brooding. Drink a little, dance a little, and cuddle up to some cute girl for the night and let it go, buddy."

"Ef only et were zat easy," Christophe mumbled to himself as he let his friend lead him down the loft ladder into the fray below of teens swaying to the music playing over the intercom, dancing in the flickering glow of the mason jar lights strung high above. His head swam with the melodious twang of the country music flittering over the intercom speakers, face flushed under the cruel intentions of the alcohol coursing through his hard French veins. He wouldn't let the redhead get to him, Christophe thought as he slammed back another drink that Clyde gleamingly put into his calloused hands.

"That's my boy, Chris!" Clyde cheered as he hooked his hand in the waist band of Bebe as she sauntered over. "Boo, which of your friends can take this guys mind off things?"

Bebe rolled her eyes as she siddled out of Clyde's grip and put her hands delicately on Christophe's waist. He arched a high eye brow, feeling his face involuntarily turn a wicked shade of pink as she swayed with the music, blonde hair bobbing on her slim shoulders, hands encouraging his still form.

"Loosen up, Chris. Break out of that hard mold of yours. Dance. Have fun."

His eyes flittered past her perfectly pink pout to the rapturous redhead with hands ensnarled in the flowing scarlet locks of Red Allen. He felt a jolt of pain sting at the core as he sucked his breathe in through his teeth, teeth he didn't realize were gritted so tight until Bebe ran a hand down his stubbled cheek and shook her head.

"Nuh-uh, stop torturing yourself, don't let his methodical actions rue you tonight. And haven't you ever heard the attage, the best way to get back, is get even? He's trying to make you jealous...so, do the same. I hear Kal has her pretty little eyes on you," Bebe said with a wink, placing a glossed kiss to her cheek as she swayed away.

Christophe looked over the crowd, finding the brunette giggling to Marci with a cup of something in her hands, dark eyes glancing at him under lightened bangs. He'd never had any interest in an of the girls, had never had any interest besides Kyle, but his thoughts were too addled by the alcohol to deny the need to feel _something, anything_ outside of the questionable presence of the Jew. So despite the roiling feeling of guilt in his gut, he let a smile play across his lips as he strolled across the dirt floor of the barn to the wide-eyed delight of the brunette.

"Christophe? I didn't think I'd see you at a social event like this," she said coyly as she averted her eyes and pushed her friend away with a smile.

"Crazier zings 'ave 'appened," he mumbled as he innocently raised a hand up and brushed her brunette waves from her face. "want to go out by ze fire?"

Enthusiastically she nodded. "Heck yeah!" she said as she laced her long thin fingers with his and nestled into his side with a brilliant smile, as he fought the sick feeling building in his stomach. He lead the way from the barn out to the large fire burning in the cleared field where his emotional nemesis was locking lips with Red, and settled down across the flames with Kal gingerly perched on his lap.

"Oh, man, I've had the biggest crush on you since grade school, y'know that?" she said with a girlish laugh, eyes glimmering under the stars. "But that sounds needy! _Gawd_! I mean, I don't expect anything to come from this just-"

Shut up, Christophe thought to himself as he laid his lips on hers, stealing her words in a nicotine flavored kiss. Her lips melted like butter to his, the acrid taste of cranberry vodka mixing on his tongue as she easily gave in. In his mind, though, it was Kyle's wrinkled nose touching his, Kyle's jagged bottom teeth his tongue swept across, Kyle's loosened curls that tickled his cheek.

And it was Kyle's questioningly furious eyes he caught watching through the flames licking upward into the crisp night sky. I hope it hurts, he thought to himself smugly as Kal pulled away for a breath.

"Wow," was all she could muster, eyes swimming. "The French really know how to impress."

"Let's go out to the truck," he said with careful smile as he stood up with her hand clasped in his. She nodded eagerly, giggling as she followed him out to the edge of the firelight where he had pared his beat-up, mud-caked truck he called his own. She stood by, hands on his waist as he pulled a blanket out of the dented toolbox mounted to the bed and laid it out, a shiver going through him as her hands worked at his hips.

"Come on zen," he beckoned as he placed his hands on her waist and lifted her with ease onto the tailgate, lips finding hers again. His brain was dripping in intoxication as his hands wound up under the soft edge of her shirt and across her pierce, flat belly. She made a noise into his mouth as she pushed away for a moment, only long enough to remove her blouse before melting back into his lips. But it was the sight of her alabaster skin under the starlight, the shimmer of the pink lacy bra in the moonlight that focused his head as he sighed and gently, but firmly, placed his hands on her smooth shoulders.

"Zis ezn't fair," he finally managed to say, tongue thick with the crashing guilt that consumed him.

"What do you mean, Chris?" she asked quizically, tilting her head with the question.

"Zis ezn't fair to you. I won't just use you, knowing nozing will come from et. I'm sorry, Kal," he said, shaking his head as he ran a hand painfully through his short, messy locks. "Damn me."

"Hey, don't beat yourself up about it, it's not like I don't know we won't be, like, together or anything," she said with an empathetic smile as she threw her hair over a shoulder. "It's okay."

"No, et's not. I just...I don't know. I just want zis wiz someone zat cares," he mumbled to himself as he closed his eyes against the beautiful girl in front of him and hung his head shamefully at the truth of what he would have done in the name of revenge.

"Oh, my, god. I get it, Chris, you're a virgin!"

"What?" was all he could respond with, peaking at the girl under his bangs that had thankfully thrown her shirt back on over the tempting curves.

"It totally makes sense now!" she said, thumping her palm on her head as the brilliance of the idea surrounded her. "I totally get it! Why I've never seen you with a girl, why you seemed so uncomfortable just now. It's okay...I won't tell anyone your secret. I think it's charming, waiting for someone like that," she said with a smile, placing a languid kiss on his cheek. "I'm going to go back to the party now, okay? I won't tell them anything I don't think I should. And your secret is safe with me, darling."

He watched her skip off back into the milling crowd of socialites around the fire with a look of disbelief...but whatever reason she imagined in her head, was good enough for him if it caused her to stay away. Heaving a sigh he laid down in the truck with his legs hanging over the tailgate, arms thrown over his eyes to dull the judgment of the heaven's above at his despicable actions.

The amount of crazy that Kyle made him was insane, that he would have so deplorably taken advantage of a young girl's feelings to get back at the red head that haunted his heart. It made him sick to his stomach to think that he would have so easily slipped into the role, so easily would have slipped into bed with kal just to get back at his own stinging heart. God, it was crazy.

"Fuck, I'm a fool. What ez wrong wiz me?" he asked himself, grating his short nails over his face.

"You know, I thought the same thing when that tantilizing bosom was pushed so eagerly your direction and you turned away like a homo," came the scathing tone of his own personal Hell. Slowly he opened his eyes to the freckled face framed with red curls staring down at him with a frown.

"What do you want?" Christophe growled, a pang ripping through him at the sight of Kyle hovering over him, face resting on his crossed arms on the side of the truck. "I thought you were 'ere wiz Red."

"Yes, but then I thought, 'let's watch Christophe make a fool of himself', and I was not disappointed," Kyle said carefully as his green eyes tracked the angry way the Mole shot upward and put the truck between them, taut muscles shaking from control under the black sweater hugged tight.

"You are such a fucking ass'ole, you know zat?" Christophe spit, hands in his hair. "You 'ave absolutely no sympathy." He shook a cigarette out of the pack stored in his back pocket and lit up, inhaling deep, smoke trickling from the corners of his mouth.

"You were the one making a show out of yourself, not me," he said with a shrug.

"What do you want?" Christophe asked, leveling his most dangerous gaze on the redhead, but it fell short...despite how hurt and angry he was, he couldn't hate Kyle the way he wanted to.

"To make sure you aren't happy," Kyle said at last as he moved around the truck and plucked the cigarette from Christophe's lips, taking a deep breath in and exhaling toward the stars. "With a girl, because that isn't you. To make sure you are absolutely miserable seeing me with one."

"Red ezn't ze first, and she won't be ze last," Christophe spit distastefully, glaring the best he could. He opened his arms, baring himself to Kyle. "Here I am, Broflovski. Drunk, to numb the biting sting of seeing you so goddamn 'app wiz anyone else. These dark circles? From sleepless nights zinking of what could 'ave done differently. I don't know what else you want from me. Et 'urts like 'ell, and you don' even give a damn."

"You always were oblivious," Kyle said with a smirk, the stolen cigarette bobbing between his lips.

"What do you mean by zat?" Christophe asked, fingernails digging deep into his palms, exhausted by it all.

"This," was the response as Kyle dropped the cigarette to the ground and pushed his lips to Christophe's, exhaling between their parted lips. Christophe froze, tasting the same bitter sweetmint as that first time years ago in the woods, but now, mixed with the acrid sting of smoke and bitter hops of the beer Kyle was ingesting. It sent an electric shock down his spine as he gulped down that smoke and pushed Kyle back against the truck forcibly, hands on either side of his shoulders.

"What ze fuck ez wrong wiz you?" the Mole asked, heart leaping in his chest. "You are so fucked up."

A sideways smile. "Maybe I always cared a little too much, gave too many damns. About a lot of things. About what people would think, but mostly, about what you thought. And then I saw you not give a damn anymore, and flaunt yourself Kal, and it drove me nuts."

"Why? Why do you suddenly care, like you 'aven't made my life 'ell for years?"

Another graceful shrug as Kyle reached a hand up and placed it on Christophe's cheek, the warmth a burn against his stubble. "Oh, I don't know, Chris. Maybe because, despite the sadist tendencies I may have acquired in this tantilizing game, it was all for a reason...so you'd still be thinking about me, even in a negative light. Maybe because your sense of jealousy made me know that you cared."

A harsh barking laugh. "You should 'ave known I cared without being a fucking prick to me. I was never the guarded one. You should 'ave known 'ow deep zese feeling run."

"Yeah, I know," Kyle replied, hand dropping with his gaze. "I'm sorry. That I never reciprocated the way I should have and the way you deserved. I'm sorry for being an asshole all this time to you, for no other reason than my own personal gratification of seeing you suffer on my behalf. I'm sorry for a lot of things, but I'm not sorry for one thing."

"And what ez zat?" Christophe asked, a hand running through his hair out of habitual nervousness.

Kyle's intense green gaze settled on the tired mercury eyes of the Mole, a sad smile playing his chapped lips. "For being inadvertantly, irrevokably, undeniably in love with you since we were kids of circumstance in a fucked up world."

"Excuse me?" the Mole asked, mouth drying up at the possibilities, ears ringing from the truth.

Kyle laughed as he pushed Christophe away, only to use the back tire of the truck to hoist himself up to sit on the edge, head cocked upward, face aglow with starlight as he watched the twinkling constellations high above. "I knew you were mine, the moment you laid in my arms bleeding to death. Part of myself died with you that faithful day, a part that I could only get back when I'm with you. My childlike enthusiasm for life. I'm only happy when I'm with you, truly."

"So zen, why 'aven't you been wiz me?" Christophe asked, resting his arms on Kyle's knees, laying his head in the redhead's lap.

"It's hard enough being one minority in a town of podunk whitebread fucks. Try adding 'fag' to being the Jewish kid, really, I can only imagine how much it would bite the big one. But then I saw you seemingly happily making out with Kal, and I didn't care, because I felt lost, and a little murderous. Well, mostly murderous, if we're being honest."

Christophe let his eyes close as Kyle reflexively ran his hands over the touseled messy locks, saving the feeling of his long fingers brushing across his scalp. He felt his world spin, and was unsure of whether it was the alcohol pumping away in his body, or the feeling of drowning in the delicate scent of Kyle on his face.

"I zink I'm flattered by zat," Christophe said as he lifted his head up and felt the world spin around him.

"As you should be, DeLorne, you - of all people - should know how hard it is for me to express myself in typical human fashion. Do you want me to say it again? I love you, Christophe Emaurri DeLorne, and I have since the tender age of nine. Now what do you want from me?"

"Just you," Christophe replied with a small smile as he pulled Kyle down into a kiss that sent fire burning through his veins, a fire that only Kyle could spark, a fire that began deep in the autumn woods years ago, a fire built from circumstance of undeniability that kindled minute after minute, day after day, year after year until the flames burned bright and out of control. The lingering of lips and hazy breath between them held the promise of more to come, of undeniable attraction that could not be tempered by the chilled night. The midnight moon watched on as the fire burned bright between them on the rickety truck tailgate and smoldered on long into the sleepless night.

* * *

><p><strong>AN: **I haven't written Kystophe in forever, and my OTP was calling for some loving. And let me say, I'm loving coy, unemotionally attached jerkkface Kyle. I may have to do this again one day ;) -Corrie


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